If anyone is interested, Spike TV airs Unsolved Mysteries from Mon-thurs at mindnight (pacific time). It's a new hour long 'version' hosted by Dennis Farina, but the stories are the same ones that were in the original.

In 1988 two former FBI profilers (and pioneers in the field) took part in a tv programme, along with other experts, to make a determination as to who, out of the seven most often named suspects, they thought was Jack the Ripper. This is an extract from a book I have:

"The list included a journalist who had studied medicine and claimed to be a satanist and who lived in Whitechapel, Dr Roslyn Donstan, an emotionally troubled schoolteacher from a family of surgeons who committed suicide soon after the final murder, Montague John Druitt, Royal physician Dr William Gull, Prince Albert Victor, the grandson of Queen Victoria and Aaron Kosminski, a deranged Polish Jew with an avowed hatred of women, who also lived in Whitechapel.

Other panelists on the programme used various reasons for their choices. The profilers were convinced that, from the evidence of the crimes and the way in which they were committed, the killer was a white male in his middle to late twenties, of average intelligence, single and never married, who did not socialise with women, and who lived close to the crime scenes. If he had a job, it would be menial work. He had probably been brought up in a broken home, where he might have been abused, and was very probably a loner, with poor personal hygene and a dishevalled appearence, who preferred a nocturnal lifestyle. Consequently, he would not be able to approach his victims with any confidence, but needed to subdue them and kill them quickly.

All five of the programmes experts chose Kosminski as the most likely identity for Jack the Ripper. In the case of the two profilers, he fitted the template so closely that John Douglas said that if Kosminski was not the killer, then someone very similar to him had been commmitting the crimes."

(From: Criminal Minds: The Science & Psychology of Profiling by David Owen)

I love everyone's contributions, although it's giving me way too much material to sift though when I'm bored

Does anybody think that the Zodiac killer will eventually be regarded in the same light as Jack the Ripper?

I'd love to know what those un-decoded cypers from Zodiac say, if anything.

I've read loads about the Zodiac Killer and even studied the press coverage for an assignment for my Journalism degree.
I personall think the murders were carried out by more than one person, the protagonist of the murders was clearly effed up, the messages that have been cyphered are full of spelling mistakes and odd culture references. The ones that haven't been cyphered were intended to be that way probably just made because the killer loved the media coverage he could get, which was clear. But the long spaces in killings and the different nutcases being identified suggests an accomplice too.
Unlike Jack the Ripper, the Zodiac killed people for no reason, he/they shot people at point blank, didnt mutilate people, and psychologically liked the thrill.
We'll never know if it was Arthur Lee Alan, but I think he had something to do with it.

While the three children played near the slide, Glover says, a man sat near her and started talking about crime, about how things happen to children. He even mentioned kidnapping. He showed Glover scars he said he had gotten in fights.

"I turned my head to look at all the scars on his body," she says. "When I turned back, I didn't see my son.''

The children Shane was playing with were not around, either. "I started walking around the park, hollering and screaming.''

The next thing Glover remembers is seeing the same two children re-enter the park through a hole in a wire fence.

"I said, 'Where's my son?' " The boy and girl said they left him in the park. Glover took the children to the police station. They were let go after extensive questioning.

Police searched and questioned Glover and her relatives. "They thought maybe a family member took him out of the park,'' Glover said, adding that police also interviewed the man with the scars and released him.

Abduction by a stranger is rare, says Sarah White, a case manager with the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, a state-run law enforcement support agency.

By far, most missing people cases are non-custodial parental kidnappings and runaways, White says.

Like Shane Walker, Christopher Dansby has never been found.

The Walker case is still active, according to Detective Cheryl Crispin, a New York Police Department spokesperson. The NYPD declined repeated requests for an interview or more details.

One lead in the days after Shane's disappearance was especially unnerving. Glover says she received a phone call saying her son was buried in an abandoned building. Police investigated and found nothing. To this day, Glover, 57, believes Shane, her only child, is alive. He would be 21.

"I just hope and pray that one day I see him,'' she says, speculating that by now he might have kids of his own.

"I would give him a hug and kiss and we'd go somewhere -- to Florida, anywhere -- just to get away, just to be with him.''

Glover and Shane's father still live in the neighborhood but left the apartment building years ago. Glover avoids walking past the playground.

"Every time I come in the area I start crying and feel depressed,'' she says. Police initially speculated, she says, that Shane might have been kidnapped and sold on the black market.

Some years ago, Glover appeared on "The Montel Williams Show," where a psychic told her Shane was being raised by a wealthy family. Glover brought a photograph of Shane and some of his toys to the show so the psychic could touch them. She said he ''was well taken care of and he was learning the piano,'' Glover recalls.

Though her time with him was short, Glover is comforted by memories of her young son. "He smiled all the time. He only laughed when tickled. ''He liked teddy bears and monkeys."

For a short time, Shane and his parents had a pet chimpanzee named James. The toddler enjoyed sticking bananas in the cage for James to eat.

Glover also recalls a trip they took to Disney World in Florida shortly before Shane went missing. He loved the rides, she says, but was afraid of Mickey Mouse. "He would just holler and scream. I had to carry him all around the park.''

Shane's recollections of her might be dim because he was so young when he disappeared, she says. Still, when she became ill a few years ago, Glover felt driven to hang on.

"I was praying that I survive so I could see him when they find him.''

If you have any tips about this case, please call 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678).

This month’s horrible Metrolink train crash brought upon a dark mood to Angelinos. From the country’s economic uncertainties, to the dim light of hope with the elections coming up, us Angelinos felt as if things could not get any worse.

The Daily Breeze has this interesting story on one of the Metrolink’s victim. Chuck Peck was among the 25 dead in the Los Angeles Metrolink crash on the 12th of September 2008. His family, knowing that Chuck was on the train that faithful evening, kept getting calls from his cell phone. No voice was on the other side of the line, no audible voices. All they could hear was static on the other side of the line.

Throughout the night, Chuck’s sons, brother, stepmother, sister and fiancee all got the phone calls after the crash had been reported. Chuck’s son believed his dad was alive and trying to contact them. Chuck’s son CJ kept yelling into the phone: “We love you, Hang in there. They are coming to get you.“‘

It was not until 3:28 a.m that the phone calls stopped. None of the family members got any more phone calls. One hour later, Los Angeles firefighters recovered the remains of Chuck Peck. Coroner’s officials told Peck’s family members that he was killed instantly. His body showed no sign that he lived even for a short time after the crash.

Chuck Peck

Could this have been a phone call from the other side? or is it just technology gone haywire? For years, the “phone calls from the dead” phenomenon has been a thing of urban legends. Paranormal cases that involve ghostly phone calls are just reports, never official recordings or actual proof that they were indeed made from the departed. One thing is for certain, the calls were made to loved ones and the calls were made all night up until the discovery of the body. To all those on board that doomed train, rest in peace.